adventures with kittens: commemoration, y'all

HAPPY ONE YEAR OF BEING OURS TO WEE LITTLE PENNYCAT!

We don't actually know Penny's real birthday, since she was born to be wi-i-ild in the wild in New Hampshire, but we estimate it is sometime in June based on what the vet told us. But we did kind of a shitty job celebrating then, so instead we are celebrating the day Penny came home to us.

Yes, one year ago today Brian drove back from NH with the tiniest little fluffbucket in the seat next to him. She was so scared and shy and I just wanted to LOVE HER OKAY. But eventually she decided we weren't so bad and now she pretty much runs things around here.

Here's a little retrospective of phone pictures:

These were the first pictures I ever saw of tiny Penny, when Brian was asking which kitten he should bring home. Look how pathetic she looks! I knew I had to have that tiny fuzzy being.

And here is the first time she was home and being sweet, as opposed to being home and hiding/trembling.

 Looking back on these, she is SO TINY.

 She fit in the windowsill!

Always resourceful, Penny figured out quickly how to keep warm when it got chilly.

 Sleeping, boozing, sleeping – Penny also quickly discovered the secret to the perfect life.

 Playing, napping.

Helping me study. 

And this is about the time Penny considered a career as a professional model. 

 ...But she quickly decided TV and naps were more important than worldwide fame.

Plus, quitting modeling gave her more time to get into (and onto) shit around the house. 

And here is Penny's first trip outside of Boston - we took her home to Mississippi for Christmas!

We also got her spayed while in the South, which led to some hilarious moments while she was super high on kitty anesthesia – she wanted to jump onto my bed but couldn't make it so she kept jumping and falling and giving me heart attacks because I was afraid she was going to tear her stitches. So I put her on the bed and she immediately wanted to jump off, and then fell over drunk as soon as she landed. I should have videoed it. It would have been bigger than David After Dentist. 

 She also discovered stairs for the first time and LOVED them.

Back in Boston, there was snow! And Penny watched it from the window for hours. Look how much bigger here than the first picture in the window!

I've never had a cat that loves to be upside down as much as Penny. She often sleeps upside down, and then when she wakes up and jumps off the bed she can usually only make it a few steps before she decides she is too sleepy to make it any further, falls over and rolls onto her back. Then she looks at us and demands to be loved.

 Sleepy, sleepy, face, put your hands up.

 

She also loves to get in boxes/bags/suitcases whenever they are available to her.

And although she doesn't fit into the windowsill quite like when she was a kitten, she still loves it.

Brian is probably going to kill me for including this picture but it cracks me up so much. Penny really has us wrapped around her little paw, to the point where I woke up one day to see her literally asleep on Brian's head.

All in a day's work.

And here she is, in her full fluff glory these days. We love you Pennycat. I'm so glad you're ours.

adventures with kittens: more to love?

Brian and I were reading Nat Geo the other day (okay, in the spirit of full disclosure, we were taking a quiz on cats on Nat Geo the other day) when we came across a picture of a Maine Coon. I've always had a sneaking suspicion lil Penny was at least part Maine Coon, a feeling that was bolstered by this quiz, so we decided to do a some digging. And we found some... big news.

source

That is a Maine Coon, y'all. And that is not a photoshopped picture (as far as I know).

Maine Coons apparently can grow to be ginormous cats. Here are some more of Penny's humongous brethren:

source

source

source

I am seriously worried that we are going to end up with a cat the size of a greyhound. I mean, obviously she would still be the cutest cat in the entire universe, but she might get a bit cramped in our little apartment if she becomes as long as the width of the kitchen. Fingers crossed that she's not full bred and since she's a lady she'll stay a bit smaller. 

Some other, less distressing facts about Maine Coons that actually explain a lot of Penny's quirks – discovered on Wikipedia – include:

• the first cat to ever win a cat show was a Maine Coon (duh, Penny is gorgeous)
• Maine Coons are known to have above-average intelligence (duh, Penny is a genius)
• since they are native to the cold Northeast, Maine Coons have several adaptations to survive in snow, including long tufts of fur coming out from between their toes (Penny has this)
• Maine Coons love water (explains why Penny always tries to get in the shower with me)
• the Guinness Book World Record for "longest cat" is held by a Maine Coon that was 48.5 inches from the tip of the nose to the tip of the tail
• Maine Coons are also known for their weird vocalizations like chirping, chattering, yowling and "talking" (Penny does this)
• a common feature of Maine Coons is to be polydactyl, or have more toes than normal (Penny doesn't suffer from this, she is perfect)

Maine Coons are also exceedingly fluffy, friendly and love to lie on their backs inviting people to rub their their mass of stomach fur. Like so:

source

Except Penny does it better.

So don't worry, Pen. You'll always be my lil girl, even when/if you are a giant freak of nature cat.

two against one

My city and my immune system have teamed up against me to ensure that instead of being out doing any of the 5893020343290 things I need to be doing to finish the several major projects I have due next week, I am in the apartment hiding out from the cold and wintry mix coming down, sneezing violently/ blowing my nose every five minutes and trying madly to get all the laundry and cleaning done before the future in-laws arrive.

Oh, and calling everyone I can think of to get interviews for said impending assignments. PLEASE JUST CALL ME BACK STATE REPRESENTATIVES I ONLY NEED TEN MINUTES.

So as I wait for the towels to finish washing, a Massachusetts Department of Transportation employee to call me back and the next bout of sneezing to attack me, I thought I’d blog.

I feel like everyone I know is on the verge of a mental breakdown, myself very much included. Mental and possibly sinus-al, in my case. The semester is five weeks from finished and I really thought for some reason that the work would start to dwindle down so we could concentrate on the longer and more important final projects. Not so. Instead there are all these smaller-but-still-important projects that keep me so busy I can't even begin to think about final stories. We're all running around like chickens with our heads cut off trying to slap together something, anything that resembles quality reporting and writing. But then Boston and Mother Nature decides April 1st would be a good day for some snow and my body decides this week is the perfect time for a raging sinus infection and I just want some SLEEP, y'all.

Plus, if that wasn’t enough, this is what my workspace looks like:

I’ll never get anything done.

P.s. Happy April Fools Day, y'all. This weather is a cruel prank, I'm pretty sure.

P.p.s. I hope Penny saved this post from dying in its own self pity.

adventures with kittens: the dark side

Ninety percent of the time I couldn't love Penny more. She is inarguably the cutest, furriest, sweetest, funniest and most playful tiny thing around.

But the other ten percent of the time, she does things like this.

She ate through THE ENTIRE STRAP. And I can't even find the piece that's missing. Utter destruction.

That bitch.

...Okay, so I can only stay mad at her for approximately eight minutes. But for those minutes, she better NOT show her face around me.

alien brides and jungle cats

You know, searching for THE DRESS is hard enough without crazy photoshopped alien models wearing the dresses you are trying to picture yourself in.

This woman is assuredly very thin and statuesque in real life, but her "legs" are over twice as long as her upper half (Which is now her upper third? See my helpful illustration). PEOPLE ARE NOT MADE LIKE THIS.

To prove my point, I have added another model to compare. I used their heads/arms to make them as close to the same size as possible. Please observe:

Alien lady has at least another foot under her! The scariest part is that the "normal" sized model is probably still ridiculously tall and a size zero-two. People aren't even made like her. I JUST WANT TO LOOK AT A DRESS AND KNOW WHAT IT LOOKS LIKE ON A HUMAN HERE PEOPLE.

Just to drive the point into the ground offer another example (one of tons):

However, if there is one practice I am in FULL support of, it's taking your bridals with a wild baby jungle cat.

Hands up if you think Brian will still be willing to marry me if I recreate these pictures with Penny?

Yeah, that's what I thought too.